Calls have been made recently by interested individuals and groups to prevail on the stalled implementation of the speed limiter installation for vehicles in Nigeria.
The latest call was made by the Chairman of the Petroleum Tankers Drivers association, a subsidiary of the National Union of Petroleum & Natural Gas (NUPENG) after their emergency executive meeting which reviewed recently the state of the nation’s roads, the lingering fuel scarcity, among other issues.
Salimonu Oladiti, chairman of PTD-NUPENG, while commenting after the meeting, made an appeal to the Honourable House of Representatives Federal Law making body to reconsider their position on withholding the implementation of the safety speed limiters on Nigerian highways scheduled for enforcement take off by the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) from April 1, 2016.
The FRSC holds on to the success of its campaign on the installation of seat belts, studies have shown that since the FRSC enforced seat belts in vehicles, death risk has reduced by 61 percent and they look forward to further reduce road crashes with the speed limiter initiative. Speed limiters (also described as speed governors) are devices that limit the speed of a vehicle to a pre-programmed maximum speed. These devices work with any type of vehicle technology including all mechanically and electronically controlled vehicle engine systems.
Oladiti said, “If you consider the rate of road accidents in the country, then it is necessary for something drastic to be done. That is why FRSC, the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), National Automotive Design and Development Council (NADDC) formerly National Automotive Council (NAC) and key stakeholders in the transportation industry embarked on a wide study, and eventually concluded on the suitability of speed limiter installation for our vehicles.”
He called on the members of the Honourable House to show compassion for the carnage of human lives on Nigerian roads, and see to allowing this novel initiative work “Our members are breadwinners of their various homes and we have lost one too many, but some of them who have fitted the devices have been relaying their positive experiences in recent times”
MARTINS NOEL
